What We Wish We’d Had for Breakfast: Meyer Lemon Cake

At breakfast time, many of us are caricatures of our best selves. We’ve got wet hair. We’re tearing to the subway or to our cars. Breakfast might be a quarter of a protein bar we found kicking around our handbags. Sad. Welcome to What We Wish We’d Had for Breakfast.

A spoonful of leftover shahi paneer korma, cold from the fridge (as cold as this in-like-a-lion and hopefully out-like-a-lamb March).

What We Wish We’d Had:

The gorgeous Meyer lemon cake on Marc Matsumoto's site No Recipes conjures warming memories of our recent trip to Oaxaca, Mexico. It’s very common to see lightly glazed lemon and orange cakes for sale alongside café con leche in the cafés of that bright, chatty city. When these cakes are done right—moist, and saturated with citrus flavor—they’re unbeatable.

Matsumoto emailed us to say that his cake had an international inspiration—just not the one we expected: “I found Meyer lemons in Japan. They’re not very common there, and I was so excited I bought more lemons than I could use.” He ended up preserving some, making lemon curd out of others, and using the rest for this cake.

The secret is the lemon simple syrup Matsumoto uses to soak the cake right when it’s hot out of the oven. Between the zest-flecked batter, the citrusy syrup and the not-too-sweet lemony glaze, it’s a knockout recipe.